A Foolish King grasps at wealth and power, as the ends, a wise King uses them as the means of government. With the one they are gorgeous, vain appendages of royalty; with the other, they are happy instru­ments of benevolence. A foolish King eyes liberty askaunt, and execrates it as the bane of greatness; a wise King knows that neither kingdom nor Sovereign can be great without it. The fool endeavours to root up what the patriot King most assiduously cultivates. A weak Prince is jealous of liberty in its lowest branches. Hence it is, that he not only strikes at the rights and privileges of his people, but is mean enough to envy the immunities of a corporation. He starts at shadows. In such [Page 114]a reign even commercial meetings are odious, because they are composed of freemen. Even Common-halls are an unlawful Congress; like that in America, they are deemed rebellious associations. How sophistically do mini­sterial scribblers labor to draw an artful veil over such political transgressions as Sovereigns without a blush avow? Can the sagacious Doctor Johnson (that ministerial hackney) any longer rally the well grounded jealousies of England and America? Can he now ask these croakers of calamity, how slavery can be brought from America into England? If he dares. I refer him for his answer to Lord Hert­ford (one of the state nurserymen) who sowed a subtle feed or two of slavery, even in our metropolis the other day. I hope, however, that these feeds will be severely choked by the rank and stubborn weed of liberty. A weed it is now deemed in the cabinet, and in the legislature, and in both condemned to be rooted up. A crop far more promising is expected. The experiment of raising it by slow degrees has just been made. His Ma­jesty, sick of all addresses but those of his faith­ful Parliament, has just declared, "that he will not receive, on the Throne, any address remonstrance or petition of the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the city of London, but in their corporate capacity." Thus is the notice worded by Lord Mansfield, Lord Chief Justice (not of the ceremonies) but of England. [Page 115]The reason, or rather the design of this is plain. For all acts done in their corporate capa­city, the city of London is responsible as a corporation. Neither the proceedings, the resolves, nor the Congress of a Common­hall, can forfeit the charter of the city; the offences (such as petitions) of the city, as a corporation, may. In the one case they act in their political capacity, in the other they do not. The Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Liverymen, are individuals, but the Cor­poration has but one neck. This ministerial mousetrap is baited by a Lord Chief Justice of England, whose duty it most clearly is, for I will teach it him, to carry the balance with an even and an equal hand, between the just prerogatives of the crown, and the un­doubted privileges of the subject.

I make no doubt but a Mansfield and a Thurloe will conduct the intended scheme as well as a Jefferies or a Sawyer. The me­morable case of the seven Bishops in James the Second's time, is now forgot at court, and petitions are once more degenerated into crimes.

Though the actual annihilation of the city charter may not be intended, as it cannot be the interest of the crown to check any source of wealth, yet the menaces, and intimidating prosecutions of a rapacious ministry, may be expected to have the same happy effects as threatening letters sometimes have among [Page 116]thieves. They found it so lately, in the case of the East-India Company, and it is not im­probable that their audacity may strengthen with their hopes.

Toys and baubles must be bought, and ba­byhouses must be crowded to amuse and divert vacant Sovereigns, and ravens must have food. The numerous mouths of corruption must be stopped. Too many stratagems, for the sake of wealth and arbitrary power, cannot be tried. For gold every coffer, for power every vein must bleed. The predictions of America, in respect to England herself, are now verifying. They are coming forward, by slow degrees, at this instant. Our ministers of late have had a strange appetite for charters. In Wilkes's case they had the daring impudence to attack the great charter of England for the sake of power. They have since been nibbling at the East-India Company's, for the sake of wealth and power both; the company com­pounded and acquiesced. They are striking again at charters in America (as their retained and pensioned advocate Dr. Johnson says) for the sake of power, and they now have their eye upon the charters of London for a royal reason,— for the sake of pursuing the com­mercial interests of this kingdom.

But are the petitions of Common-halls, or Common-halls themselves so dreadful? Are the meetings, or more properly the great [Page 117]Councils, of this metropolis so terrible? Are they not the meetings of meritorious citizens and loyal subjects? In both these capacities they have addressed, and in both they have offended.

How harsh and grating is the voice of truth! How unhallowed are the lips that dare to utter it before the throne! Approach it, ye British slaves, upon the knee; adore it with prostration, but profane it not with a petition! Upon this mercy seat, alas, the So­vereign will no more receive petitions from his faithful citizens and friends, from those who supply his wants, his superfluities, his extravagancies, and his plenteous coffers. Upon this sacred seat he can only listen to the sycophantic addresses of a corrupt and de­structive Parliament; those leeches of the realm who so largely drain, for their own abandoned uses, those coffers which his re­pulsed citizens so largely fill.

How like a God does a Monarch look en­circled by treacherous minions and rapacious flatterers! How like a mere mortal surround­ed by subjects most affectionate and sincere, who shower down at once both supplies and blessings upon a Prince whom they honor, esteem and love!

But Kings should quit the tract of mortals, they should disdain the little virtues of hu­manity! The spirit of a Monarch should as­pire [Page 118]at an excentric character beyond the reach of man. This will nobly lead him not to endure, but to repel the humble suits of his aggrieved subjects; not to caress, but to detest his people; not to sooth, conciliate and appease, but to menace, insult and exter­minate; not to human errors, but inhuman crimes; not to reformation, but to murder. Not to justice, but to tyranny. Not to peace and honor, but to remorse, hatred, calamity, resistance and the scaffold.

Let such Princes, like that unhappy tyrant Charles the First, seek in vain for shelter a­mongst the fawning herds that idolize their vices, for the sake of sharing their prodiga­lity and profusion.

Let them try their faithful Scots, who, as they have often received the wages of cor­ruption, will a second time receive the price of blood.

Let them fly to the arms of those tender tyrants their preceptors, who have thus care­fully trained them to their ignominy and ruin from their cradle.

Whilst they repulse a suffering and an in­jured subject, let them fall, for consolation, upon the friendly bosom of a Mansfield or a Bute.—Let them, in their frenzy, fly for suc­cour to their Chancellor,—not a York, alas, but an Apsley, the poor shadow of a Mansfield! Let them most deservedly taste all the bitter­ness of despair and find relief (though late) [Page 119]at last, in the generous condescension and for­giveness of a despised, insulted, and oppressed people.

Astonished then, my Lord Mansfield, not at the humble, just petitions, but at the lenity of their patient subjects, let them deliver up their minions to the block, with shame and contrition resign the crown, and sleep ignobly with their fathers; but let their infamy be recorded, that succeeding Princes may pro­fit largely from such weak and guilty annals.